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Dan Clowes (1961- ) was born in Chicago, Illinois and studied art at the Pratt Institute in New York. His first professional comic work was the Lloyd Llewellyn series being a darkly humorous satire of 50's middle class hipster culture - a mix of 1950's pop culture, a retro-cool vision, Raymond Chandler and bad Dean Martin movies. However his next series, Eightball, demonstrated the range and diverse styles with which he is able to bring to his stories. The Oscar nominated Ghost World movie (starring Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi, with Crumb director Terry Zwigoff) was based on the story serialized in Eightball. His work has featured in Weirdo, The New Yorker, The Village Voice, Esquire, Vogue, Time magazines as well as numerous CD covers. He currently lives in California, USA with his wife, Erika. Interviews: Resources: Reviews:
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ESSENTIAL READING: |
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"... Clowes slices beneath the surface anger to show the sense
of loss that haunts them, particularly Enid. The ghosts in her
world are reminders of how much she has changed and will change,
ghosts summoned by old toys, old clothes, old songs. Ghost
World captures that painful first flowering
of nostalgia. Clowes reminds us that even the most perfect adolescent
friendships are as brittle and fleeting as the pop passions of
our youth." |
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"Using old ideas to build new ones, exploring new frontiers
of the narrative and formal possibilities of comix while keeping
his work readable and entertaining, Eightball
#23 continues Dan Clowes' ascendancy as one of America's
top comix artists. Even if you hate superheroes, this one will
come to your rescue." |
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"Ice Haven weaves more than 30 short strips into one cohesive
portrait of a strange suburban town shaken by the disappearance
of an odd little boy. Bruisingly satiric and brilliantly designed,
Ice Haven will have you gleefully reading it two or three times
in a row to unlock its complex interconnections." "Working in his familiar milieu of slightly exaggerated suburban
weirdness, Eightball #22 continues
Clowes' development as one of the premier comic artists working
today. Unlike all past issues the latest contains just one story,
completely self-contained in the single issue. But just to mess
with us a bit, the narrative has been divided into 29 vignettes
that range in length from a single strip to several pages. Some
of them continue a running narrative throughout the book and
others are just 'one-shots.' This Altman-esque technique of weaving
different story threads across each other forms a tapestry of
lives rather than a straight narrative. Several things hold all
the pieces together. They all take place in Ice Haven, a burgh
whose only distinguishing characteristic is a pustule-shaped
rock outcrop known among the locals as 'our friend.' A central
mystery also begins to take shape through many of the vignettes.
With explicit overtones of the Leopold and Loeb murder case,
the disappearance of a dopey-looking kid becomes the running
theme of the book... Though it sounds intimidating, newcomers
should feel no trepidation about starting with this issue. In
fact, it makes for an excellent primer of Clowes' art at a low
price." |
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"Curdlingly good…" "Shorter pieces are fun, and they draw people in to reading
the magazine. My intention with shorter pieces is to not repel
readers, as a long continued story might do. But the fun, short
pieces are actually harder because you have to distill your ideas
down into one page. Every one page story I've done could easily
have gone on for pages and pages. I've wasted so much material
by turing out those little wacky, one page vignettes." |
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"Clowes has made David
Boring the
most readable comic novel of the year." |
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Graphic Novels: Periodicals: |
Ice Haven 
